Posts: 16

Someone recently signing up on the forum mentioned this, and I thought it might be an interesting question to discuss.

The Site and forum faq, which is here doesn't actually have any questions related to political correctness, or more specifically what sort of language to use on the forum.

I still personally hold to the opinion I expressed In this topic about rules where one member asked if language such as "blink" or "blindy" should be banned, namely that unless someone is being personally offensive to anyone we shouldn't police what people say.

That being said, obviously since we have sighted devs and other people registering on this forum who might, as indeed this new member did, worry about what to say I do wonder if we need a question on reassurance. After all I, probably like most other people here have had the "yes you can use the word blind/visually impared around me" sort of reaction in reality, and obviously the quicker people are over that reaction, the quicker we can get to an actual between human beings rather than just thought of as an example of homo blindus weirdus.

To that end would a question in the faq help?

Equally however there is a counter argument, namely that if we point it out in the faq, would that be conflating the issue where there wasn't one? Since manifestly if a perfectly reasonable person registers on the forum and is using language freely, seeing a question which says "use language freely" might have the effect to its intention.

What do people think? I'm genuinely not sure on this, hence why I decided opening the matter for discussion was a good idea.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

I accidentally voted on the thing before reading the post, to me it didn't look like there was a post to read. Really, in response to that question, I believe the term "political correctness" itself should not be used. I can understand your points for it to exist, and given the amount that people like us throw around the word blindy and the serious amount of "fuck you" pumping through this thing that an entry would make sense. I would be very careful about the wording, so that you are saying a general freedom of speech with exception to direct personal attack is how we role. Would definitely avoid using the phrase anything goes, because that does attract trolls. Don't consult me for full wording of it. The question itself I may suggest would never use the term political correctness, but I think really something more along the lines of are certain choice words allowed in posts, or what are the cases where a filter should be used? I would hope to believe that when reviewing/criticizing a game or product that we could be at least semi-decent about it, even if it sucks we can give true reasons why it sucks, and maybe use the term sucks or is a waste or whatever, without resorting to calling the product/developer a useless piece of shit that needs to fucking die in a hole. Ya feel me?

----------An anomaly in the matrix. An error in existence. A being who cannot get inside the goddamn box! A.K.A. Me.

I think using the word 'sighted' is in itself just as bad as 'blink' or 'blindie' personally, since it sets a line between blind and sighted devs. That being said it can be viewed as a slippery slope argument. Personally, I'm fine with saying what you want as long as you don't go after somebody, if Dark made a game that was buggy and I said, quote:

This game is a buggy piece of shit that won't run on <insert systetm here>

That IMO wouldn't be going after Dark, but merely the game, whereas if I said Dark was for example a demonstrative bastard, that'd be a personal attack, IMO.

Also, I haaaaaaaate the term political correctness. It's a bullshit softly softly approach to not offend anyone that does absolutely nothing at all to help anyone in the long run.

EDIT: Okay wnt to edit and blanked on what I was gonna add. Okay remembered it now. It was that highlighting issues makes a mountain out of a molehill, I feel.

@x0, I realise I was possibly a little unclear in this topic by me using the word "political correctness", a term which can cover a multitude of sins.

What I meant here specifically, was a question in the faq to the tune of "yes its okay to use words like blind, sighted, visually impaired, disabled etc on this forum as long as your not attacking someone personally"

This is as I said an area we've been asked about a couple of times in the introductions topic, which is why I brought it up, though whether having question in the faq about this would be more likely simply to create an issue where there wasn't one, rather than smooth over visitor's potential fears I'm not really sure, hence me opening this topic for discussion.

On the more general point of bad language, the faq already has a question about swearing, and makes the point that bad language isn't specifically banned but personal attacks are, this was a question more specifically about using words identifying blindness and disability.

On an even more general level I'd say JaceK is broadly correct, you actually are! quite free to say "game x is a piece of shit that should die in a hole" So long as firstly, your remarks are about the game only and not about the developer, ---- though this might be rather difficult to quantify since if your using such emotive language to describe something someone has made, your walking an extremely fine line not to at least imply, if not out right state that the creator of game x is by literal definition a shit maker .

And secondly your aware that saying "Game x is a piece of shit that should die in a hole" is at rock bottom phrased just as an opinion and therefore doesn't really tell anyone anything at all other than you think Game X is bad, and therefore doesn't exactly contribute to the discussion much.

/So while you can! say "game x is a piece of shit that should die in a hole", whether you should! is another question .

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

Yes, but if you quantify why game X is a piece of shit for reasons 1-500, then I'd argue you've made a valid set of points, no matter how good they are, they area set of your opinions mixed in with (hopefully) facts.

On another note, I'd very much like to see the retirement of 'oh a sighted dev' or 'look a sighted dev' mentalities though. I get it, people who can see are new around here but to me it seems at times like the sighted get gawked at like curiosities to a degree, if anything I'd argue sighted is a far more divisive term and could well be taken to draw a line in the metaphorical sand as I said up there ^

Hmmm, JaseK, your point about sighted devs is an interesting one, though I would personally be of the opinion that highlighting the problem with any official rulings is more likely to make it worse than better.

people seem to forget that both of the webmasters and the ones who setup this forum and sight are themselves sighted, and that we have a major sighted developer on the moderation team too .

Then again, it is always pleasant when someone comes from a more major indi games background to create audiogames out of their own interest, or when a developer who hasn't heard of accessibility before has the idea of creating an accessible game, or including accessibility in their existing game, and highlighting those good cases of access development is always imho a nice thing to do since developers, like anyone else tend to like feeling appreciated.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

I think that's an assumption that since person X is blind, everyone else MUST be blind on the site. I wasn't saying make it a rule, I was more saying I'df like to see that attitude change over time. however.

I could easily get how it's a reverse stigma, that in some cases sighted devs may feel the odd ones out hearing about Jaws and NVDA and Orca and Voiceover and being scared off by it though or scared off by the idea of making a game accessible, or being scared off by the idea of blind people playing games, ya know, assumptions/stereotypes.

Side note: Why exactly are most web control panels well laid out but never quite do what you want? I nearly deleted everything on my own site earlier trying to adjust the name of a forum. I thought I hit save changes, I was worried when it came up asking do you wish to empty the following forums... and listed the whole lot. Cue this guy hammering the back button as fast as possible....

I couldn't think of anything more stupid/degrading to say than piece of shit that should die in a hole so overlook me on that one please. We've seen the lot of you probably just shouldn't post this to Sam Tupy's games, usually with bad English. It's like a YouTube comments section. Also OT but how do I request a status be added? Do I make a thread or is there one or do we do it in pm's or what?

----------An anomaly in the matrix. An error in existence. A being who cannot get inside the goddamn box! A.K.A. Me.

Hello folks! Well, let's take it to a technical point of view, right? I'll talk about me now, so let's proceed. I lost my vision completely since I was 5 years old. So I can not say I'm visually impaired, right? I got no vision to be damaged or reduced. I got no vision, so I'm blind. And this is a word as any other and should not be considered offensive in general terms. Even brilliant can be used in a bad way if the user wanted to. So, for me it is not a big deal.Best regards, Haramir.

@Haramir, the issue here isn't whether anyone has a problem with the word "blind", its just about whether there should be a question somewhere in the faq saying! that nobody has an issue with the word blind .

@JAseK, actually, developers who usually have enough interest in accessibility to come onto this forum, or who have been asked onto this forum by a member likely already have had at least a brief introduction to screen readers etc, so there isn't usually an issue, take a look at the introductions thread as an example.

Remember it says on the main page that audiogames.net is about games based on sound, so most devs know what they're in for by the time they come here. I only asked about political correctness and whether we need something of the sort of "yes its okay to mention the word blind on the forum", because one dev in the introduction's thread actually asked about it.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

In my honest opinion, the best way to deal with these types of situations is to look at each on a case by case basis. Language and communication is very complicated and is never really black and white, sometimes it can be but at the same time in a lot of cases it isn't. Personally I have pretty thick skin and not a lot would really offend me, and I don't feel the need to soften the names of the condition I have to make myself feel better. I generally am not in favor for being "politically correct" as in most cases it's just an attempt at trying to put a zero-tolerence stamp on what is good/acceptable or bad/unacceptable, and soften language. I also feel that this can limit the free expression of everyone. Not saying OP is trying to propose some kind of restriction on people either, this is just my opinion.

Again, I think people are slightly misunderstanding the question here.

This is not about whether we should! have a restriction on using words like "blind" or "visually impaired" on the forum , but whether we need a question in the faq telling potential new members that yes, using words like "blind" is okay, because someone asked, and yes, did use the term political correctness.

Hope that is clear.

As I said in the first post I don't know, since on the one hand people who haven't encountered blind/visually impaired people before often do worry about what language to use, so a bit of reassurance might be helpful, on the other hand whether telling people there isn't an issue would be more likely to create one I don't know, hence the pole in this topic.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

I doubt it would be an issue if you did put one up, though, I guess that depends how often you get asked such a question whether it would be worth putting in a "Frequently asked questions" section. For a question to be put here, I'd think you would've had to have been asked this question err... well... Frequently. In my personal opinion, one or two people asking wouldn't really be worth the effort, but if I had to answer the question more than once a day, that might be a cause to actually write something up on it.

Well many of the questions in the current faq as it stands are sort of preemptive frequently asked questions, that is we provide an answer so they are not! frequently asked .

In this case, its not something I've been asked about every day or even every week, but it is something I've seen on occasions when sighted devs come onto the forum, either in the introductions topic, or back before the registration system got changed, sometimes in sighted dev's first post.

So while I wouldn't say its come up "frequently!" it has come up more than once or twice.

if I were to add a question in the faq it would simply be something like

"Can I use words like blind or visually imppaired on the forum or do I need to call it visually challenged or some other politically correct term?

Nope, nobody here will take offence at words like blind or visually impaired and its much easier to have an honest discussion by using honest language"

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

Right, I think that's a good idea. I either see one of two reactions, people sort of freak out a bit if they use words like 'watch' versus hear, like did you watch or did you see that video, and they think that's offensive. Or the other side of the coin where people are twips about it if I say I watched this or I saw this, and they're like well how did you see it, etc. in a smart assy attitude that makes me want to drop kick them into eternity.